SAN DIEGO — A San Diego man who was stuck in Costa
Rica after being put on the U.S. government's "No Fly
List" is finally back on American soil.

San Diego State graduate Kavon Iraniha, 27, spent the past
year studying international law in Costa Rica. He was not
allowed to board a flight home to San Diego this past
Tuesday from a Costa Rican airport after being told he was
on the U.S. government's "No Fly List."

When he went to the U.S. embassy, Iraniha — an
American-Iranian Muslim citizen — said he was
interviewed by FBI agents for several hours but was still
unable to fly home.

Iraniha said the FBI questioned him about his recent
travels to the Middle East, including Iran, where he
visited his family.

On Thursday, Iraniha finally made it back home to San
Diego after finding a loophole. Instead of flying directly
to the U.S. from Costa Rica, Iraniha flew to Tijuana and
then simply walked across the border to San Diego.

The Lemon Grove resident still doesn't understand why the
U.S. government allowed him to come home on foot, but not
by air.

"I'm happy to be home, finally in my hometown where I was
born and raised," Iraniha told NBC 7 San Diego in San
Ysidro Thursday evening.

Upon finally arriving in San Diego, you could see the
relief on Iraniha's face and on the faces of his parents
and brothers who met him at the San Ysidro border
crossing.

For Iraniha, it has been a long journey home.

"You see my bloodshot eyes? I'm still going through it, it
was very tiring and it was very depressing," he said.

His journey began two days earlier in Costa Rica, where
the SDSU graduate just got his masters in international
peace.

He was at the Costa Rican Airport ready to fly home when
he found out he was on the "No Fly List," which bans any
passenger considered a security risk from boarding a plane
bound for the United States.

Iraniha and his father spoke to FBI agents that day and
said agents never explained why, exactly, he was on the
list in the first place.

"None of this makes sense. Whoever did this is not
American. I'd like to know why they did that," said his
father Nasser Iraniha Thursday.

A spokesperson for the Terrorist Screening Center, the
agency that compiles the "No Fly List," said Thursday they
cannot release any information about any individual cases.

Despite the ordeal Iraniha went through, the American
citizen said he will love the country where he was born
and raised.

"We have so many freedoms here that you know you don't get
everywhere else," he said.

It is still unclear whether or not Iraniha and his family
will seek legal action against the U.S. government.